|
|
Season of the Witch
Satan makes a booty call
1972
Review: January 27, 2009
Director: George A. Romero
Starring: Jan White, Raymond Laine, Ann Muffly, Joedda McClain
You'd better believe it.
THE SETUP:
1972 woman is unhappy with her life, takes up witchcraft to gain control.
DISCUSSION:
I totally forget how this made it to the top of my list, but it was there even before I realized it was by George Romero. We open with a nicely spare credit sequence as a woman follows a man through the woods. He walks forward, snapping branches back toward her that hit her and scrape up her face. She looks none too enamored of this fellow, who we rightly assume is her husband. During this time we read the special thanks to Klein and Letterle Dry Cleaners, the Dan Dee Car Wash, and note that costumes are courtesy of Gimbel's, all of which is making me love this film just for being so unpretentious and low-budget. We also see that we are to be treated to a title song by Donovan. Anyway, we are hearing all these strange and jarring noises, like a sudden telephone, as the woman walks by a baby lying on the ground, and is soon collared by the husband and led to a kennel, where she is put in a cage. Okay, so we're obviously in some sort of dream, but it goes on so long we start to wonder: is the whole movie going to be like this? Then the scene changes, and her husband is introducing her to her life as a realtor might to a new home… here's your daughter, here are your friends… he opens the door and shows her "the handyman," who can help her around the house and with "Etcetera… only you never wanted the etcetera. You've gotta get with it, Mrs. Mitchell, you know it's later than you think!" Then the woman is left alone in the room, but everywhere she turns she is confronted with her older self! Then—she wakes! Yes, it was a nearly 8-minute opening dream sequence! Papa, I think I'm in LUVVVV.
So the woman, Joan, is awake, and that guy was her husband, Jack. She goes to her psychologist—the same guy who played the kennel keeper who put her in a cage—and he tells her "the only person imprisoning Joanie is Joan." We find out that Joan lost a child before her daughter was born. When their sexy teenage daughter goes out, Jack calls after her "Try to stay a virgin." That night she and her husband go to a party where a guy is running around playing Mad Libs, then calls everyone's attention to read it. This is an adult man we're talking about. One of Joan's friend's, Shirley, says she's going to a psychic who claims to be a witch. That night, when she wakes Jack by having a nightmare, he doesn't ask her what's wrong, he just says "We're all right, kid," and goes back to sleep.
Joan accompanies Shirley to the witches' house for a tarot card reading, where she gets a disturbing reading about a "dark-haired woman." I loved the witch, she was a normal 70s woman, just maybe a touch TOO Earthy, confrontational and familiar—I totally remember the type. On the way home, Joan says she doesn't like the "kick-y" aspect [as in "it's just a temporary kick"], that she really believes it and wants to explore witchcraft further. Shirley says she knows her husband is having an affair, and Joan expresses how unhappy she is in her marriage. It's also been quite noticeable how much of the talk is of "kicks" and "scenes" and "keeping up with the times." Basically, they're at a time when everything is supposed to be permissible, especially in terms of sex and drugs and religion, and if you don't like it, you're "uptight" or "behind the times." This movie really is brilliantly ABOUT 1972, and the social situation with the ideological leftovers of the 60s.
So Joan's daughter, Nikki, is having her boyfriend Gregg over, who also happens to be Nikki's professor. Mom is pressured to accept this, or be labeled "uptight." Gregg is a very smooth 70s dude with an overly open mind and who regards everyone who disagrees with him in any way as hopelessly square. God—WHY can't I go back to the 70s!!?!? It seems so unfair. Anyway, Joan and Shirley are supposed to go out, but end up staying home and drinking with Nikki and Gregg, despite Joan describing her and Shirley as "bored kick-seekers." Shirley gets drunk, and Gregg makes up a cigarette to look like a joint, and proceeds to [seem to] turn Shirley on, despite Joan's protestations. Shirley—under the impression that she's high—gives vent to her frustrations at being old and considered less attractive, and how this has made her obsessed with her appearance. Gregg is being inappropriately flirty, Shirley starts to have heart palpitations—it all gets pretty intense. That night, during a storm, Joan hears Nikki getting fucked by Gregg, and gets all eroticized herself. She—and WE—are haunted by this bull sculpture we cut to like 578 times. In the morning Nikki is furious her mother was there and runs away. Then Jack comes home and beats Joan for not "kicking ass" when she heard her daughter getting it on. The movie has earlier made it clear that Jack takes a slightly more-than-healthy interest in the state of his daughter's hymen.
Around now, the attentive among us are noticing that Joan's clothing selections from Gimbel's are becoming ever more witch-like. She goes to see Gregg, who says he was no idea where Nikki is because he has no commitment to her, because this is like the 70s and we're so far beyond that, then he tells Joan that is she ever wants it, he wouldn't say no. That night, she has a dream that a masked man is stalking outside, trying to get in. He finally does, and rapes her. So Joan goes on a shopping spree at the witch store. Those of a certain age will remember when MasterCards looked like that one below—memories! I haven't seen that in ages.
SPOILERS > > >
That night, Joan performs a spell that Gregg will come to her that night. When he doesn't show, she tries a more conventional method—the booty call. He comes over and fucks her. Her husband is away on business, btw. Joan has the same dream, about the intruder outside. She booty calls Gregg again! She does more spells! Then the intruder is outside for real! She shoots the fucker! And it was Jack, come home a day early! Which means that she is free of her oppressive marriage, but without messy divorce proceedings, and free of that sticky legal culpability! At the end, we see her at a party, where she is still introduced as "Jack's wife," but then forthrightly says "I'm a witch." There's a little fairy tale-type harp flourish on the soundtrack, and we out!
< < < SPOILERS END
What a happy surprise—here I expected a straightforward horror film, but what we get is not horror at all, but just a loose, low-budget look at the horror of a woman's marriage in the early 70s. It is very specifically of its time—in a good way—as it captures that time after the 60s when everyone was supposed to be liberated and everything groovy and me okay and you okay, but actually resulted in a lot of difficulty putting all that into practice. This movie makes the case that sexual liberation actually freed men to fool around without guilt, but left women over a certain age unwanted sexually, but with the guilt and accusations of being "behind the times" if they weren't happy about the situation. In addition to still having to take care of the dishes, washing and cleaning. One of the things I liked about this movie is that Joan wasn't presented as this woman warrior who knew exactly what she wanted and was just furious that her marriage was such a disappointment, but a confused woman bewildered by finding herself in this family situation at this certain time in history and just having no idea what to do.
I also like that she doesn't just go to the magic store, become an A-1 witch, and take care of all her problems. The movie could be seen as not including any element of the supernatural at all, and when it's over, it's not by any means certain that Joan is in a better position than she was at the beginning—okay, well maybe she is, but not by much. But she still has plenty of problems and we have little indication that her new hobby is going to do much but fill up her now-free nights.
I also just like the ambition of the thing. Who does Romero think he is? There is an interview with Jan White on the disc where she mentions that Romero didn't plan on just making horror movies when he was starting out, and this can be seen as a sample of some of the interesting stuff he was looking to branch out into. Also in here is discussion of the film under its original title, Hungry Wives, as they tried to sell it as softcore. If you rent this, DO NOT MISS the hysterical Hungry Wives trailer, trying to sell the very movie under a different name as about wanton, lonely housewives who need it bad. Anyway, if you’d like something a little more experimental in your horror scene, go for Season of the Witch.
SHOULD YOU WATCH IT?
Why yes, I think you probably should.
